[admin] Using the NANOG list as a paging mechanism

Perry E. Metzger perry at piermont.com
Sun Jan 6 22:01:18 UTC 2008



"Martin Hannigan" <hannigan at gmail.com> writes:
> We'd like to politely note that paging each other on the list without
> content or context is generally off-topic.

I understand the motivation, but I think the "paging" messages should
be allowed.

I've done it myself, in desperation after exhausting all other ways to
find a needed contact. I don't think that the current rate of
"desperately searching for contact at provider X" is impossibly high,
and often this is the only way to find a contact you really, really
need. Certainly people should be encouraged to try all other
possibilities first, but what if you already have?

> These messages are perceived by many as fragments that are not
> useful to the wider community.

Compared to most of the other traffic here, they're actually
useful. The endless debates haven't helped me much over the years, but
the couple of times I've really, really needed to find an appropriate
contact and had no luck any other way, this list has come through for me.

> If you could provide some level of detail as to why you are
> using the list to reach someone, it would be much appreciated.

In my own instances, posting private security related information to
the internet seemed like a bad idea, so I must politely refuse.

-- 
Perry E. Metzger		perry at piermont.com



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